


Catch and Release

by bironic



Category: Original Work
Genre: Bondage, Breathplay, Cloaca, Dubious Consent, Interspecies Sex, M/M, Merpeople, Multi, Multiple Assailants, Other, POV First Person, Rope Bondage, Underwater, Underwater Sex, binary sex assumptions, comparative anatomy, objectifying pronouns, threat of drowning
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-06-24
Updated: 2019-06-24
Packaged: 2020-05-18 15:51:24
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Rape/Non-Con
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,243
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19337677
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/bironic/pseuds/bironic
Summary: Already, this human radiated distress, its struggles desperate, its face pinched. It no longer released any bubbles. So the first thing I did after I grasped its bound arms and halted its descent was press my mouth to its own.





	Catch and Release

**Author's Note:**

  * For [monsoon_moon](https://archiveofourown.org/users/monsoon_moon/gifts).



> All credit to Disney's _The Little Mermaid_ and to _Hook_ for concepts exploited in this fic.
> 
> Dear monsoonmoon: Sorry this treat lines up more with your original signup than with the additional prompts in your letter, which I didn't see until the draft was well underway. Hope you still like it!

The fire caught our attention one evening in midsummer. 

Flame being, of course, so exotic to us sea-dwellers, our group of friends swam closer to see. Not too close—"when fire appears, humans are near," as the warning goes, and although we were perhaps more susceptible than most to the lure of the forbidden, no one especially wanted to be brought before the council on charges of human contact—but near enough to discern that a passing ship had caught ablaze.

The waters churned and foamed near the surface, and light flashed across the sky above; a stormy night for the creatures who lived where water met air. Doubtless such a bolt had caused the ship's distress. Between the waves came glimpses of burning sails and rigging.

A body plunged into the water in a burst of bubbles. Another followed, further off. Then a third. The humans were abandoning their vessel. 

Most kicked their way back to the surface with ungainly legs, weighed down by clothes and in some instances shoes. One, however, continued to sink. 

I knew my friends shared my fascination, but I was the only one who ventured closer, confident the chaos would prevent the other humans from noticing me.

This particular human had become tangled in ropes and torn bits of sailcloth. Though it thrashed, its limbs remained trapped. Blackened edges suggested its clothes and trappings had smoldered before entering the water.

A wonderful, terrible idea came to me. 

I dared to swim nearer still—Markos called out my name—until I hovered but a few arm's lengths away. Only then did the target of my interest register my presence. Its eyes flew wide despite the pain the sea salt surely caused it.

Every child learns early on that although humans resemble us in body, they are more closely related to whales and porpoises, in that they can't extract oxygen from the water. Yet they lack those animals' efficiency, unable to last more than a few minutes below the surface.

Already, this human radiated distress, its struggles desperate, its face pinched. It no longer released any bubbles. So the first thing I did after I grasped its bound arms and halted its descent was press my mouth to its own.

It jerked away from me as if shocked by an eel, looking, if possible, even more alarmed than before. I frowned at it. Surely its exertions meant it did not want to die? I clutched a handful of the dark hair at the back of its head and pressed again. This time I was able to part its lips and force into its lungs the oxygen I drew in through my gills.

The human caught on quickly; it allowed me to deliver several long breaths that went some way toward easing its panic. Good. I wouldn't need to return it to the surface before I had the opportunity to try what I wanted. 

We fell into a rhythm where each time it exhaled into the water, I took a needed breath of my own. Slow sweeps of my tail held us at our current depth.

Holding the human by one arm, I slid the shell blade from my belt: the only item I wore besides my arm bands, the water being so warm this time of year. I drew away to see what I was doing. The human stiffened when it saw what I wielded, then subsided when I began to saw at a rope that crossed below its torso, where, beneath its billowing clothes, its body mysteriously transitioned into legs rather than a tail. I wanted to see it for myself. I wanted to know what it felt like. Was it as erogenous a zone for humans as rumors suggested?

The last fibers of the rope gave way. The human wriggled, but I hadn't loosened enough to release it from its predicament. I delivered another breath as I tugged the newly exposed portion of its lower garment away from its skin. Then I cut an opening over its genitals. Ah—a male, then.

The human bucked backward in a spray of bubbles. I let it go, giving it time to remember that it—he—would sink and perish without me. In the meantime I reholstered my blade and studied the small tubular appendage that floated against a backdrop of dark hair. 

Sure enough, after several long moments staring at me and trying once more to escape its bonds like a fish caught in one of its own people's nets, it—he—flexed toward me and strained for my mouth.

I gave him what he needed while I explored the unfamiliar contours at the apex of his bound legs. Such softness, such warmth. Such a strange and intriguing texture, this hair everywhere, in contrast to my own people's smooth skin and scales except at the scalp. The phallus was reminiscent of a seal's, not much larger than my hand when I closed my fingers around it. Oh!—it pulsed in my grasp and seemed to grow firmer. The human arched his lower body away from me, but he couldn't move beyond my reach without disrupting our lifeline. Soon he gave in to gravity once more.

Behind the phallus was a pouch of sorts, delicate skin enclosing something that felt slippery and spherical. The human's flinch instructed me not to probe too firmly.

The currents around us shifted beyond the effects of the storm and struggling bodies above. 

My friends had joined us.

They gathered in a loose circle. Although they hung back at first, already the electric frisson of their arousal was strong enough to make my skin tingle. I met Timaios' golden eyes without breaking my pseudo-kiss with the human. His lips parted as he watched. 

Markos rested a hand on my shoulder. At his silent request, I moved aside, though I kept hold of my human by one bound arm as before. Markos clasped the human's head between both hands and pressed a breath into him. My own excitement surged at the sight, mixed with a surprising hint of jealousy.

Markos drew back, then grinned at me. The human didn't seem to know where to turn. His frantic gaze fell on me as though seeking protection, despite all I had already done to him. The front of my tail throbbed with pleasure.

We looked at one another—Timaios, Iason, Markos, Alexios, and I, Theron—and made the unspoken pact: _I won't tell if you won't_.

Together, we made quick work of the human.

A few words and gestures, a bit of jostling, and soon we'd stripped him of the ropes below his waist, using the excess to ensure his arms remained secure behind his back. We tugged off his boots, held his legs wide and rent his lower garment along the gap I'd created, baring all. 

Everyone wanted to touch, but to be fair, we took turns providing his oxygen and containing his thrashing in between investigating all the differences between his lower body and ours: the divot in the middle of his abdomen, the fat and muscle at his rear, the hair that continued all the way down to the knobby joints where his legs became feet, the curves and ligaments and toes there, and of course in particular the reproductive and excretory organs, at first with our hands and then, as we grew bolder, with our noses and mouths as well. The waters zinged with our arousal.

To my delight, despite his continuing struggles the human did not seem unmoved by our explorations either. As we tongued his soft sac and stroked the pliable flesh behind it, his phallus swelled and lifted higher. When Markos tried pushing the tip of one finger into the anal opening further back, the human vocalized for the first time and bucked in our grip, but as I was the one giving him breath at the time, I saw how his eyes darkened while his phallus bobbed, so I surmised he did not mind the intrusion as much as he pretended. I stroked his hair and sealed my mouth over his once more as I traced my fingers around the rim of my awakening cloaca, the ache growing deliciously unbearable.

An uptick in commotion far above: one of the ship's masts had cracked and crashed into the sea. The hull listed and groaned. Lightning illuminated several smaller, dark shapes. Humans swam toward them before disappearing with a splash. Ah; emergency craft. 

I could have played with our human all night, but I knew we had limited time before his reappearance alive among his shipmates could no longer be explained.

A competition, then. After a brief conferral amongst ourselves, we fell on him with renewed intent. Would Iason's fingers in his anus be the act that pushed the human over into climax? Would it be Timaios tugging at his phallus and sac? Or Alexios teasing the accessible strips of chest and arms and back between the ropes while their mouths locked? 

When my turn came, I hooked my arms around the human's thighs from beneath, spreading his legs wider than Alexios and Markos already held them, and took his phallus into my mouth. The position gave me extra room to prod here and there, where the human had so far protested most vigorously, while I tongued at the now quite hard organ. I paused to lick higher, along the smooth skin of his hip where his dorsal fin ought to have been, teasing at the edge of his upper garment where the ropes cut off our access. The human twisted and shook in our grasp. Selfishly, I wanted it to be me he gave in to. Alas, my allotted few moments finished before he did.

Nevertheless, there were advantanges to watching. Straining now in a way that allowed me to fantasize that he was trying to reach completion beneath our touches rather than wrest free, the human leaned forward to meet the breath-kiss of each new partner, his demand for oxygen wearing us out faster than at the start. His face had darkened and his hands clenched behind his back. Had his arms been free, I like to think he would have clung to us. 

I was not the only one whose free hand rubbed at their cloaca with growing urgency.

In the end, I was gifted with the best of both worlds. With me sharing my breath and pulling on his phallus, Markos pressing his nose and tongue between his legs from behind, Timaios and Iason holding his knees open, and Alexios tracing the contours of one foot, the poor conflicted human arched and climaxed in my arms, shouting bubbles into my mouth.

I couldn't help it: his surrender, his thrumming body, the hot cloud of his sperm blooming against my tail triggered my own climax. I stroked myself through the last contractions with a groan, unable to remember the last time an encounter had felt so satisfying, so intense. From the sound and electrical charge of it, Markos agreed.

The human bumped at my mouth, insistent. Ah—I'd neglected him while distracted. Fortunately, Markos relieved me and allowed me to catch my breath.

The others shot their release into the increasingly cloudy waters. At least the lack of women meant we didn't need to worry about anything becoming fertilized.

The doomed ship with its dangling mast gave its own final, massive groan, and with a great swirling suction at the surface, it began to sink toward us. We swam the short distance required to remove ourselves from harm's way, toting the human along.

It would doubtless be safer for us to let him sink as well, as he'd been destined to at the beginning, but there was no way I could do that now. So when we'd recovered enough, Markos and I cut away the remaining ropes and twists of sailcloth, and everyone let go.

The human immediately kicked away from us. I was no expert, but it seemed to me that his expression cycled through anger, disgust, confusion and relief. Did I imagine the remnants of arousal there as well? He rolled his shoulders, regaining enough range of motion to maintain his depth. We all watched his awkward kicking and sweeping arm movements with fascination and not a little amusement. His loose, exposed genitals didn't help.

Finally, he swam back to me—I couldn't help but feel a swell of pleasure that he chose me of his own volition—and grabbed two handfuls of my hair. Intrigued by his attempt to assert dominance, I let him; I waved off Markos, who'd reached out to separate us. The human's brown eyes narrowed, searching mine. I gave him—or should I say, I allowed him to believe he took from me—a few final, deep breaths. Then he pushed off from my shoulders and swam hard, half-naked, for one of the rescue boats.

Markos laughed and turned a quick loop. I understood his need to find a release for this fizzing thrill. Alexios teased Iason for having been the last to climax. High from our unexpected adventure and our shared secret, we joked and jostled one another as we glided toward home before anyone, human or mer, decided to investigate.

I wondered what tale the human would tell his shipmates.

I wondered if he would ever choose to return.

I wondered what new tricks we could devise if he did.

**Author's Note:**

> Working title: What happens under the sea stays under the sea


End file.
